Official Minzatu: MFE prepares two financing lines under SOP-HRD, for SMEs, tourist operators

The Ministry of European Funds prepares two financing lines with the money still available under the Sectoral Operational Programme Human Resources Development (SOP HRD) for the current financial year, one for the acquisition of digital skills for the employees of the SMEs, but also for students and pupils and, respectively, one for the qualification of the hotel and restaurant staff, Minister Roxana Minzatu announced on Saturday in Brasov.

"There are two financing lines we work on. (...) Both would be programmes that we would launch with the money still available for the current year, under the SOP HRD," said the Minister of European Funds.

At the same time, she stated that it is possible that, under the Regional Operational Program (ROP), Axis 2, a new call for projects will be launched for companies that operated on the market for more than one year, as required by entrepreneurs.

"It is an older discussion that the financiers - the Ministry of Development and the MFE - have with companies that already operated on the market for more than one year. It is a financing line that many entrepreneurs access, this Axis dedicated to the existing SMEs has ongoing contracts worth 1.4 billion euros, which means a lot, given that the available budget was 850 million euros. (...) The need to launch new calls is very strong. The budget may not be extremely generous, but it is quite likely that it will be launched," said Minzatu.